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Gilbert Hill Is On Shaky Ground

Situated close to Bhavans college in Andheri (west), Gilbert Hill is a rare and unique volcanic structure that is now in the danger of collapsing because of haphazard growth of buildings around it.

On Tuesday morning, when another deluge hit Mumbai, large boulders of black basalt came crashing down from the top of the 200-foot-high hill, much to the shock and dismay of locals. Fortunately, no one was hurt as people were indoors due to the downpour.

A resident who witnessed the incident said: There was a loud noise as boulders came crashing down during the rains. The earth shook and everybody was very scared.

Geologist and former IIT professor, V Subramanyan, who has been studying Gilbert Hill for the last five years, said the incident was a clear sign of the damage inflicted by unmitigated development all around the structure.

The hill has been declared a national monument by the Geological Survey of India, but it is highly unstable due to the reckless encroachments.

A number of highrises have come up all around Gilbert Hill in recent years, triggering concerns for its stability. The Bombay HC had directed an IIT-Powai team to survey the hill and suggest measures for its protection.

The HC has also stayed all constructions around the hill for the past one year. The ruling may help rescue the pre-historic structure believed to have been formed due to a volcanic eruption around 65 million years ago.

Nowhere else in the country is there a residual hill formed of columnar rock like this and it so deserves to be preserved at all cost, said Subramanyan.

Gilbert Hill has survived the extensive quarrying that has been going on all around it for years. One of the trustees of Gaondevi temple situated atop the hill, S Pardeshi, told TOI: We have appealed to the municipality, collector and other authorities for years to save the hill from builders and other encroachers, but nothing has happened.

Excavations at the hills base will remove the toe support for the columns and destabilise the hill and in due course, the columns will open up at the top and fall off on the sides, according to Prof Subramanyan.

The only solution would appear to be to grout the joint-openings between the columns so that they do not spall off on the sides.

Source : http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/

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